


even Derek has to lick the spoon, it's a rule

by Teaotter



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Baking, Community: fan_flashworks, Community: love_bingo, Fluff, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Mama Stilinski Feels, Stiles can cook, in my headcanon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-11
Updated: 2013-05-11
Packaged: 2017-12-11 12:30:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/798744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Teaotter/pseuds/Teaotter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles and his dad have different ways of coping with his mom's birthday.</p>
            </blockquote>





	even Derek has to lick the spoon, it's a rule

**Author's Note:**

> If you're interested, you can check out the [Cherry Spice Nut Torte](http://heron61.livejournal.com/761296.html) recipe that was inspired by this story.

Stiles sends another text to his dad – _just checking in_ – after he starts the oven preheating. They have different ways of coping with his mom's birthday. His dad works late, or drinks (or both, not that Stiles can hold it against him). And Stiles... bakes.

Learning to cook was a matter of self-defense after his mom died. His dad had never been much in the kitchen, and there were only so many frozen pizzas a hypochondriac boy could eat before he started to worry about pepperoni-ing his insides. So he broke out his gran's _Joy of Cooking_ and set to. Stiles never learned to enjoy making meals, but he could do it.

Baking, though. His mom had loved to bake: chocolate chip cookies, lemon bars, shortcakes... She tried everything at least once, if it involved flour and sugar. Not that she was any good at it, really – those cookies almost always had the edges burnt, and the lemon bars would run. But she would laugh, and Stiles would laugh, and they'd eat it anyway.

She used to bring Stiles into the kitchen with her and let him measure out the flour into the bowl. He got to stir everything, no matter how much of a mess he made, and she always let him lick the spoon. 

She said it was the best part. Before you found out if it would set wrong, or burn, or crack and never come out of the pan cleanly. Before you had to worry about the ending, you could just enjoy the sweet possibilities that lay before you.

So for her birthday, Stiles bakes. This year, he's making a cherry spice cake with cream cheese frosting. The recipe calls for cherry pie filling, but his mom always hated stuff like that. So Stiles bought a bag of frozen cherries and puts them in a saucepan on the stove to make his own. 

By the time the pack arrives, the whole house smells like cinnamon and cherries, and Stiles is humming happily under his breath. He gives Isaac the bowl and the measuring cups for the dry ingredients; Scott gets the cream cheese and the mixer, for making the frosting. Derek hangs back in the doorway while Boyd and Erica start separating eggs and threatening to throw the eggshells at each other. But not even Derek's perpetual brooding can bring Stiles down today.

He used to take the cakes to the graveyard, on her birthday. He brought paper plates and candles, rain or shine, and set up a little party by her headstone. He used to think it was his time to be alone with her, the way his dad was.

But this year, Isaac asked if he wanted company. And suddenly, Stiles looked around at these crazy people he was starting to think of as family and realized that they'd never met his mom. And he wanted to share her with them.

So he fills the layer pans carefully while everyone waits, just the way she did. He leaves a pool of batter in the bowl, softly pink from the cherries. And once the pans are in the oven, he hands out clean spoons to everyone – including Derek, who doesn't get to sit out this tradition, no matter how much he glowers – and passes the bowl around so they can all taste the batter.

It's still the best part.


End file.
